S. R. Praveen

One of the surest bets for audience appreciation in the current purple patch of Malayalam cinema has been realistic police procedurals. An intriguing screenplay bringing out all the crucial little details of the investigation and a fairly surprising twist in the tale could turn a film into a box office winner. But this trend is now slowly turning into a formula, with makers at times mechanically repeating all the familiar beats of the genre.

A kidnapped girl, a missing dog, exotic fishes that get stolen, a feared Mexican mafia don and a couple of smaller dons, a psychopath, a bumbling policeman, and a pet detective. One would need this basic checklist to keep track of the numerous subplots that are cramped into The Pet Detective, directed by debutant Praneesh Vijayan The writers appear to be aware of this rather confusing mix that they get one of the characters to periodically narrate the series of events till then, just so that no one gets lost. But then, it is sometimes a pleasure to get lost in a world in which things do not get serious beyond a point, just like in comics. Clearly, this is the space that the makers are aiming for, where even a Mafia don does not look too dangerous, but at times ends up as a laughing stock. In its staging, editing patterns and over-the-top performances, the film attempts to capture this comic energy. Yet, for a film of this nature, the jokes that land well are just about a handful.

The simplest of stories, even the seemingly unappealing ones, can turn into fairly engaging pieces of cinema once it gets into the right hands. In Avihitham, filmmaker Senna Hegde, who co-wrote the film with Ambareesh Kalathera, does not have an elaborate story to tell, but teases out several strands out of it to pull off something which keeps one engaged.

Balti comes accompanied with the tag of a ‘sports action film’, with Kabaddi being the sport in the spotlight. For a while in the beginning, debutant filmmaker Unni Sivalingam appears to be keen on living up to this tag, serving us some intensely fought and tastefully shot Kabaddi matches. But by the halfway point, Kabaddi gets firmly pushed to the background, only for a glimpse of it to be shown in the epilogue.

To create a humorous situation around the ubiquitous ‘Dolo 650’, like the one in Vineeth Sreenivasan’s Karam, requires a certain amount of ingenuity. But, humour depends on the setting as well as the timing, and this particular attempt at comedy may have worked in a different setting. In Karam, it just happens to be placed in the middle of a person’s attempt to breach and bust a dreaded human trafficking ring, causing the humour to fall flat.

Sometimes, the final moments in a movie suddenly brings its title to mind, making us marvel at the ingenuity of naming it that way. Jeethu Joseph’s Mirage attempts something similar, only that one is left wondering how the titular warning was not fully understood. The final act of the movie is filled with mirages, one scene after another, each of which misleads us into thinking that this is the big reveal, only for the screenwriter to throw another ‘twist’ in the tale at us. After encountering several such mirages, one huffs and puffs to reach the real climax of the film, vowing never to trust any character in a film. In the larger scheme of things, screenwriters Jeethu and Srinivasan Abrol are also seeking a mirage — that of the perfect thriller climax which no one would guess. Red herrings, convoluted stories and obscure incidents tenuously connected to the narrative are thrown at us with this sole aim. That also proves to be the film’s undoing.

Folklore carries with it the natural burden of old ways of thinking and the inherent tendency to not stray from what has been handed down over the generations. Often, when filmmakers take inspiration from folklore, knowingly or unknowingly, their approach to the material too is weighed down by the past. In ‘Lokah Chapter 1 : Chandra’, folklore appears to have inspired the people behind the film to think anew, not just in terms of the film, but for the Malayalam film industry as a whole. A particular bit of folklore that almost every other Malayali has grown up with, but has been forgotten in recent years, courses through the veins of Lokah in its original form in a flashback sequence for the ages, which has some of the best use of intercuts. It is also a lesson in using well-timed flashback sequences, delaying that revelation until close to the halfway point, leaving behind some major impact. This revelation will send a chill down the spine for most Malayalis, but it is doubtful whether it will resonate in the same manner outside Kerala.

Towards the fag end of Odum Kuthira Chaadum Kuthira, when one character asks - “Do you sense any logic in this joke?”, it appears to be one last-ditch effort to convey the filmmaker’s intentions to the audience. Clearly, the film is set in an absurdist landscape. It is the kind of film in which the father of the protagonist, who has slipped into a coma, would say, ‘Till now, he was a question mark to us, now he has become a com(m)a’. But such jokes, which land, are few and far between, for even absurdist humour requires a sense of timing and rhythm for it to work. What we get instead is a series of misfires that punctuate a screenplay with no sense of direction, just like the protagonist Eby (Fahadh Faasil). We are pulled into his life the night before his wedding, when his fiancée, Nidhi (Kalyani Priyadarshan), expresses a wish. In the quest to fulfill the same, Eby ends up facing a crisis.